Cabin Fever
by OmniscientPancake17
Summary: The winter storms have rolled in, but with dragons, things are a little bit warmer on Berk. Still, being cooped up in the house isn't fun, for a teenaged Viking or his Night Fury friend. Luckily, there's always time to stretch your legs and do a favor for the girl next door. Mildly fluffy one-shot set in the Bound universe.


**Hi, all. You might know me from my story Bound. I'm coming to you with a one-shot set in the universe. It's the only one I've written, so I wouldn't expect any more to get posted, but I thought some might enjoy a short, fluffy scene checking in on these characters.**

**So, to fully enjoy this one-shot, I would recommend that you read Bound, but it's not imperative. For those who don't know, Bound is a rewrite of HTTYD1 with a key change, so this story's pretty standard in terms of what might naturally follow from the events of the movie. Still, I like it and I think it's time I put it up. I hope everyone reading this feels the same.**

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**Cabin Fever**

**_A Bound-verse One-shot_**

Hiccup sat at the desk in his room, scribbling a charcoal pen across some paper. He was designing an improvement to the dragon-feeding system in the village. Their situation was fine as it was these days, but nothing ever quelled his itch to invent. With some sharp designing and a little luck, he could convince his dad and Gobber that such an enhancement was necessary. They were taking in a lot of dragons, after all.

A bitter wind came in from the window, shoving the ice-cold air into his room. He wore a heavy fur coat over his shoulders to keep warm. It made more sense to just close the window but staying warm in the frigid air was an odd comfort. Hiccup cast a look over his shoulder at Toothless, who was fast asleep on his warm slab. The Night Fury's torso rose and fell with its breathing, the dragon blissfully comfortable.

If only Hiccup could say the same. A blizzard had come through on Berk yesterday, dumping two feet of snow on the village and forcing everyone to stay in their homes. It was gloomy and cold again today, which meant there was little chance that the snow would melt by tomorrow. Stoick was downstairs, surely seated next to a raging fire in the hearth as he worked. Hiccup would've joined him, but he really appreciated the quiet of his own room.

The weather was frustrating, because Toothless' tail _really_ needed maintenance done on it, but only the forge would have the tools for the job. He supposed that he could get Toothless to fly him there, but the outdoors was a different animal right now and he really didn't feel like freezing to death in the process of searching for the things he needed in a smithy full of snow.

Hiccup murmured to himself, pulling the end of his pen away from his teeth and drawing lightly on the paper, "Let's see, if we make the basin a little wider, we might be able to…"

Something tapped from his window. Hiccup turned his head to look, finding that Toothless had woken up as well. The Night Fury's ears stood tall, and on the windowsill was a little Terrible Terror.

More precisely, it was Scamp.

Scamp was sort of the Hoffersons' dragon, an occasional nuisance that had worked his way into the family's heart and earned a spot as the household pet. Astrid had explained that she'd met Scamp at the smithy when he was still in his coma and kept Gobber from shooing him away. The Terror had shown up at Astrid's window a few days later and charmed his way into being fed a few morsels of fish before flying off. He'd returned the next day and swindled the same out of them. Little by little, the tiny dragon became a mainstay in the Hofferson home.

Obviously, Stormfly was number one when it came to the Hoffersons and dragons. But Hiccup suspected that Scamp didn't mind, so long as he kept receiving bits of food here and there.

"Hi, Scamp," Hiccup greeted. The Terror hummed in greeting, and Hiccup noticed the small rolled-up scroll attached to his front leg. "Got something for me?"

Hiccup patted his hand on his desk and Scamp flew across the room, landing underneath Hiccup's hovering hand and nuzzling against it. Hiccup fingered the small parchment off of the dragon's leg. Terrible Terrors were excellent trackers, he'd learned, so they'd become an ideal way to send messages. Right now, Berk was simply using the small dragons back and forth across town to get in touch with others, whether it was for a summons or just to say hi. Gobber had started using the little guys to inform customers when their orders were ready so that he could hand them over in a timely manner and not clutter up the smithy.

Hiccup hoped that they'd be able to refine the technique and start sending messages long-distance, eventually. The Thing was coming up, and with it would come the emergence of Berk's new ways to the other tribes. If they could convince the other tribes to begin accepting dragons like the Berkians had, Hiccup's idea might be able to come to fruition. It would be a much faster improvement over sending messages by ship, which could take days or even weeks most days and was totally impossible in the wintertime because of ice in the ports.

Carefully, Hiccup unrolled the message, finding a few quick runes scrawled on the top of the page.

_Great weather we're having, huh? – A_

It was a message from Astrid, as he probably should've expected. Hiccup smiled, wondering what she was up to right now. Probably the same as him, lounging around in her room because of the snow confining her to the house.

There was plenty of space left at the bottom of the page, so Hiccup scribbled out a response.

_Yeah, I love freezing to death in my own house. – H_

Hiccup rolled up the message and reattached it to the strap on Scamp's leg. "Thanks, Scamp. Take that to Astrid for me, will you?"

Scamp hissed—in a friendly way—and took off from the desk, flitting out of the room through the window and disappearing. Hiccup smiled as he watched the little dragon go, and he felt Toothless' eyes on him. He looked over at the slab in the corner of the room and saw that Toothless was indeed looking at him, almost jealous?

"What?" Hiccup said, "You're too big, and you can't fly on your own. Much as I'm sure Astrid would love to see you, that would cause a whole bunch of problems."

Toothless snorted and slumped back down on the slab, moaning pitifully. Being cooped up like this was _terrible._ "I know, bud. It'll all be over soon, and we can go flying again, I promise. Welcome to your first winter on Berk."

Hiccup returned to drawing up plans and a few minutes later, Scamp returned with another message.

_I bet Toothless is bored to death. – A_

Hiccup wrote back: _Yep. He really wants to go flying. Right now he's napping on his slab. – H_

Using what was left of the parchment, Hiccup drew up a quick sketch of Toothless on his slab, not getting as detailed as he would normally like to but still scribbling out all of the Night Fury's features from the ears to the tail. He rolled up the message and tied it to Scamp's leg, and the little dragon left again.

When Scamp came back, the tiny dragon had another message. _He should be glad that he gets to sleep in your room. Stormfly is too big for the house so she's cooped up in her shed. I left her a bunch of food before the blizzard hit, but I don't know if she's eaten all of it by now. – A_

_I can check on her with Toothless, if you like. I'm no stranger to defying Dad's orders. – H_

_Oh, believe me, I know. I won't beg you to, but I'd appreciate it. There's no telling how long I'll be stuck in here and unable to feed her. – A_

Hiccup glanced up at Scamp, who was patiently waiting with his little eyes fixed on the tiny bowl of dried fish on Hiccup's desk. He'd been offering the Terror a small snack for each message that he delivered to Astrid, but now that it was a drawn-out two-way conversation, he had some suspicions.

_Hey, you're not feeding Scamp every time he takes a letter for you, right? – H_

The answer came back a few minutes later. _I totally am. Are you? – A_

Hiccup scoffed and tossed a disappointed look at Scamp. "I see why they gave you your name, you little sneak." He wrote out a response, _I'll stop giving him snacks, then. He's going to get fat. – H_

Hiccup slipped the message into the holder on Scamp's leg. "Alright, go take that to Astrid." Scamp blinked at him and shifted his eyes in the direction of the basket of fish, and the Terror's forked tongue made an appearance at its lips. "I've caught onto your game, Scamp. Astrid's giving you enough snacks over there."

Scamp deflated, sputtering in disappointment before lifting off of the desk and flying out of the window to deliver the message. They kept sending messages back and forth for a while, and while he waited, Hiccup ripped another chunk of blank parchment from his stack and went to work. The charcoal pen followed his command and he drew out a meticulously detailed portrait of Astrid. He sketched Stormfly behind her, standing protectively over her girl as Astrid hefted her axe at some unseen enemy. The drawing of her wore a stormy glare, and he penciled her blonde locks braided in a ponytail and curled around her shoulder, frayed at the end in some chaotic yet frighteningly beautiful way.

Admiring the drawing, his heart fluttered. Ever since he'd woken up, they'd started trying out this new thing in their friendship. They'd hold hands when they walked, and flirt so much more openly than ever before. Sometimes they'd sneak away from the village and meet in the forest to kiss or just hold each other and talk about their day without the scourge of prying eyes. They never went beyond a certain point, of course, but Hiccup was more than fine with that. Sometimes it all felt so scandalous or wrong, with her feeling about him in that kind of way.

She did things to him, and he was pretty Thor-damned happy with the knowledge that he apparently did those same things to her, too.

When Scamp returned with another message, Hiccup answered by rolling up the drawing and slipping it into the holder on the Terror's leg. Scamp took off without another word, now accepting that he wasn't also going to be able to steal snacks from Hiccup. The Terror returned to the window another few minutes later.

_Thanks for the drawing, it's really good! I think I'll put it up on my wall. – A_

Hiccup smiled and wrote out a response and sent Scamp on his way. Once the Terror flew out, Hiccup stood up from his chair and started to walk out of the room. He paced effortlessly toward the door, having grown used to his prosthetic over the past few months so that it no longer hampered his walking. Stairs could still be challenge, though, so Hiccup held tight onto the railing as he descended to the house's first floor.

Stoick the Vast was hard at work, as expected. The Chief hunched over stacks of papers, huddled near the fire as he stroked across each paper with a charcoal pencil, probably just leaving his signature behind on them all. At the sound of Hiccup coming down the stairs, Stoick looked up and brightened.

"Afternoon, son. Finally get bored of being upstairs by yourself?"

"Nope, I have Toothless to keep me company," Hiccup answered. Stoick frowned, half-offended but knowing that Hiccup was just kidding around. "I need to grab a bag of fish; we're going to go check on Stormfly and make sure she's being fed. Astrid is kind of stuck in her house."

"You know where we keep them," Stoick said with a slight gesture to the far wall in the kitchen. "You're speaking to Astrid?"

"Yeah, we're using the Terror Mail thing," Hiccup explained. He reached the wall and leaned down to grab a full sack of fish, hefting it over his shoulder with a grunt.

"I'm glad it's working," Stoick said.

"What are you working on?" Hiccup asked, walking about halfway to the fire. The hearth's warmth reached him halfway across the room and he shivered for a moment, appreciating the heat.

This was another new thing in Hiccup's relationships. Before everything that had happened, these moments between him and Stoick were so rare. They never asked one another what they were doing. The extent of their dialogue was, more often than not, nothing more than simple good mornings and good nights and 'I'll be back'. Nowadays, they dedicated time every single day to discussing their days, and their intermittent conversations were always full of questions.

"Oh, just some preliminary negotiations before The Thing. You know how Mogadon likes to send his proposals for the new trade agreements a few months early, but I can't send them back to him because of the ice in the port."

"Doesn't he do that every year?"

"He does. What he asks for in these is always significantly more than he really wants, so he can negotiate down to what he's actually after when the meetings start."

"Smart."

"Aye, and frustrating, too. Fortunately, I have a decent read on the man by now. He rarely leaves The Thing happy with whatever agreement we come to."

"The best compromise is one in which neither side is happy, right?" Hiccup recalled from his lessons about chiefing. Stoick chuckled and nodded.

"That's right. So, you have been paying attention after all."

"I always pay attention; it just doesn't look like it. What else you got over there? Surely Mogadon didn't send you a packet listing every little thing he wants, right?"

Stoick snorted and looked down at the rest of the papers near his hand, "The rest of these are just land and livestock deals, really. Making sure I keep tabs on our inventory and such. As much as I enjoy having The Thing on Berk every few years instead of another island, the strain on our resources is never fun."

Hiccup nodded in understanding. As the hosts for this year's Thing, they had to house and feed the visiting chiefs and their accompanying dignitaries. "Well, we do have more animals right now than we're used to, right? And more than enough fish?"

"Aye. Your little beasties have helped with that," Stoick said, "How's your leg doing?"

"It's good," Hiccup looked down at his prosthetic.

"You're not leaving it on for too long, are you? And you're not wearing it to bed?"

"No, Dad. Believe me, I'm taking _great _precautions to preventing those nasty bruises. You don't have to worry about me."

Stoick smiled, "That's good, son. I'm glad you're figuring things out."

Hiccup smiled back and then gestured to the stairs, "Okay, so, I'm gonna go get Toothless ready to fly and visit Stormfly, we'll be back."

Stoick nodded, looking back at his papers. "Be careful, son. Don't stay out for too long, you'll freeze to death."

"Wouldn't dream of it. I like being alive," Hiccup retorted, and Stoick stifled a chuckle as the boy galloped back up the steps. Upstairs, Hiccup skipped into his room, the sack of fish hefted over his shoulders. "Hey, Toothless, ready to fly?" he called, and Toothless shot up from his slab with an interested coo. "Just a quick trip to feed Stormfly for Astrid, but hey, it'll be great to stretch our legs, huh?"

Toothless warbled in agreement as Hiccup grabbed the dragon's prosthetic fin, raising an arm to defend himself from Toothless' excited sniffing and snorting. Hiccup nudged his way to Toothless' backside, dropping to sit down on his tail and attach the fin. Toothless hummed and Hiccup strapped the fin in place, brushing a hand over the gears before working to attach the rigging.

"Well, let's hope this thing holds up for a quick errand. It'd suck to have it break in the middle of a snowstorm," Hiccup said. "You'd get me home safe, though, right, bud?" Toothless purred and nudged Hiccup's side, as if to promise that he would.

Before they could go, Scamp returned to the windowsill with a hiss and a new message strapped to his little leg. Hiccup reached out an arm and the Terror hopped on, allowing Hiccup to take the message from its leg and read it.

Toothless complained as Hiccup leaned over his desk to write out a response, terribly impatient to get going. "I know, I know, just let me write this message to Astrid and then we'll go, you jealous reptile!" Toothless sat down on his haunches and snorted, annoyed.

_Heading over right now to check on Stormfly. – H_

Hiccup rolled up the message and latched it in place onto Scamp's leg, releasing the Terrible Terror into the winter weather. "Alright, now we can go, Toothless. Was that really so hard?" Toothless snorted dismissively and wandered up in front of Hiccup, letting the teenager climb onto his back and latch his false foot into the catch. From there, Toothless took three quick steps and jumped, squeezing through the open window and immediately spreading his wings to catch the frigid wind.

Berk was completely coated in snow. The sky was a hazy gray, and the ground a blinding white. Ice filled the nearby port, landlocking everyone on the island like it had been doing for months now. Hiccup leaned to the right and Toothless executed a hard turn, curving around a full 180 degrees and flapping through the icy weather in the direction of Astrid's house.

Toothless resorted to gliding, no need to truly _fly _in order to get halfway across the village to the Hofferson home. Stormfly's shed was right next to the house, smaller in size overall but still perfectly suited to the Nadder's frame. Toothless landed with a loud _thud_ on the house's roof, eyes wide as he looked down at Stormfly's shed.

The Nadder poked her head out at the sound, one of her golden eyes spotting Hiccup and Toothless on the roof. The dragon's interest was instantly piqued, and she squawked.

"Hi, Stormfly. We brought you some dinner," Hiccup called out, gesturing to the sack on his back. Stormfly lit up, purring excitedly and shimmying out from inside the shed. Still on Toothless' back, Hiccup dragged the bag off of his shoulders and lazily lobbed it off of the edge of the roof, causing it to smack into the snowy ground and spill its contents. The snow was thick enough that the fish didn't sink underneath it, and Stormfly happily bolted over and helped herself.

"You weren't kidding!"

Hiccup and Toothless looked to their right, spotting Astrid poking her head out of her bedroom window. She was watching them at an angle, and her blonde hair was unbound and fell down her back and off of her shoulders. Hiccup's breath hitched; he'd never seen Astrid's hair down.

"Terror got your tongue?" Astrid asked, grinning.

Hiccup snapped out of it, shaking his head and blinking to regain his composure. "N-No, I just… your hair."

"Oh, yeah. I figured there was no point in braiding it if I was going to be sitting around the house all day with nothing better to do," Astrid explained. She ran a few fingers through her hair, tucking a few locks behind her ear.

"I like it," Hiccup said honestly, "But isn't this like violating some ancient Viking law, me seeing you like this? We do have weird rules about hair."

Astrid smirked at him, "Are you implying this could become a scandal?"

Hiccup shrugged, "Berkians are fickle. We could be having an innocent chat, but if someone sees, all sorts of rumors'll start to fly."

"I can duck back in here and wait for you to leave, if that's what you want," Astrid suggested, smirking even harder. She started to slip back into the window and Hiccup stuck his hands out to flag her down.

"Wait, wait!" he protested, and she stopped, leaning back out of the window and grinning. "Toothless wants to say hi," he feigned.

"Hi, Toothless," Astrid said with a wave, and the Night Fury answered with a greeting warble.

Down below, Stormfly's squawk caught their attention. The Nadder pranced about in the snow, having finished all of her dinner.

A thunderclap sounded in the distance, rolling in from the sea and echoing over Berk. Hiccup and Astrid looked at the incoming clouds, and Hiccup sighed. "Well, does that mean more snow? Or just a really, really cold rain?"

"Either way, sounds like we're going to be stuck in these houses for a few more days. Nothing's melting anytime soon," Astrid lamented.

Hiccup shivered as a frigid wind followed the thunder. Regrettably, he looked over at Astrid. "We should go, before I turn into another icicle on your roof." Astrid laughed, an angelic giggle that made her eyes glow when she looked back up at him.

"You'd make a handsome icicle," she flirted.

Hiccup's cheeks burned. "Alright, we're going," he said, embarrassed. He patted Toothless' neck and the Night Fury prepared to take off.

"Don't wear your prosthetic too much!" she called after him, "And stay warm!"

Astrid slipped back inside, and Toothless leaped off of the roof to glide back to the house. They slid in through his bedroom window and Hiccup detached Toothless' tail while shaking off the cold. Toothless wandered over to his slab and spewed white-hot flame in a circle before lying down, resting his head and closing his eyes.

Hiccup returned to his chair after tucking away the fin, leaning over the desk and ripping off a sizeable piece of parchment. He grabbed one of his pencils and lowered it to the paper, stopping just before he could begin drawing. He paused and then looked down at his legs, and in one swift move he detached the prosthetic and let it fall to the floor.

Now relaxed, Hiccup refocused on the paper and began to draw a portrait of Astrid with her hair down.

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**How was that? Good? Terrible? Let me know in a review, if you'd be so kind.**

**Since I'm guessing that I'll get a few questions about sequels, I'll go ahead and jump ahead of the curve. There is a _Bound _sequel in development, but it's a good ways off from ever reaching the posting stage. I've written a lot of it, but have had absolutely no beta work done and definitely want to make those rounds first. On top of that college is getting tougher and tougher as I go through major classes so the time that I dedicate to writing is lower than ever. Since I probably won't post any more one-shots, I'll try to leave important updates on my profile. Check every couple of months. If I get to the point where I'm about to post, I'll add a chapter to _Bound _and officially let everyone know.**

**Thanks again to everyone for reading, and have a great rest of your night.**


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